Palladium and Dorsett Hotel [ Photo: @sbcalling ]

Over the recent years we have seen the transformation of the buildings alongside The Lawn, the original name of the road on the west side of Shepherds Bush Green: the reconstruction of the site where the post office used to be will soon be complete, another new hotel, in a contemporary style building which might sit uncomfortably in the distinguished streetscape it shares. Its immediate neighbour is the Grade ll listed Dorsett Hotel, in the building which was once the Shepherds Bush Pavilion: this started life in 1923 as a palatial cinema, suffering war damage in 1944, restored in 1955, and becoming a bingo hall in 1983 – which closed up in 2001, leaving a derelict, lifeless heavyweight on the streetscape.  It was spotted by Dorsett Hospitality International in 2008, and given a new purpose with an imaginative and ingenious conversion to a luxury hotel, bringing life and style but retaining the gravitas and history of the original building, and winning our Environment Award in 2015.

Cinematograph inscription reinstated (alongside The Empire)

Next to the hotel is another piece of Shepherds Bush history, a building recently known as the Walkabout, which started life in 1923 as a 760 seat cinema – Pyke’s Cinematograph Theatre; this was enlarged and upgraded, introducing the front arch and pediment which is retained today, to become the New Palladium Cinema.

The venture proved short term, and changed hands to become the Essoldo, then the Classic, and finally the Odeon 2, which closed in 1981. Derelict for some years, it then became the Walkabout pub, which provided a popular and noisy venue until it, too, closed in 2013, leaving a diminutive, shabby building struggling to survive between its distinguished neighbours. The Dorsett Hotel came to the rescue, recognising the potential of the building with a wholesale reconstruction, led by the designers of the Dorsett Hotel conversion.

Palladium frontage

Palladium Plaque by HBG

LBHF planning played a significant and positive role in guiding the design process, together with the involvement of the Historic Buildings Group who provided the plaque wording as part of its advice, alongside the Hammersmith Society. The Dorsett magic has successfully transformed the Walkabout into such a handsome building, which now comfortably fills the space between its two important neighbours. The triumphal arch and classical pediment, retained and restored from its cinema days, anchors the 7-storey high frontage, with a crisp vertical geometry of brickwork and stone fins rising above. The design brings a confident stature to the building and comfortably earns its place in the streetscape, a visual resonance with the corner tower of the decorative Shepherds Bush Empire alongside and with the brick entrance pavilion to the Dorsett Hotel.

Inside the building, the ground level provides for a restaurant, linked into the hotel, basement level provides space for entertainment, and the 7 floors above accommodate 74 serviced apartments. To minimise the impact on the Pennard Road houses at the rear, the building steps down, from 7 storeys at the front to 2 storeys at the back. At the front, the glass screen within the entrance arch brings a view into a lobby which serves the basement venue, something of an anti-climax in the context of the grand arched entrance, perhaps calling for some creative interior design which may be on its way.

Over the recent years Shepherds Bush Green has been transforming itself, with the revitalising of this streetscape on the west side, the opening up and new landscaping of the Green, the energetic and glitzy north east corner entrance to Westfield, and the new Shepherds Bush station. With the tentative plans to renovate the West 12 shopping centre,  the adjacent hotel well out of the ground, this upgrade is developing a momentum which holds great promise for this very special corner of the borough.